Nice summary from the Center for American Progress on the various ways in which Rice is dangling out in public, having asserted things that are not quite factual lately: Condoleeza Rice’s credibility gap.

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on Monday, March 29th, 2004 at 2:00 pm and is filed under the_usa.
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2 Responses to “Rice’s Credibility (Or Lack Thereof)”

Could of, should have, would have? What is the 9/11 commission focus? We can dissect the past decisions made to limit CIA intelligence in counter terrorism. We can assign blame for failure of fluid communications between the various intelligence communities. We can find people in positions that should have known how to prevent this calamity. However, we can look back 60 years and point to the similar failures in communication leading up to December 7, 1941. We can hang scapegoats like Kimmel and Short and this time hang Tennet and Rice. (Kimmel and Short were later exonerated by congress, after their deaths). It seems like the people pointing fingers have just as much responsibility to shoulder as anyone else. Let’s blame Al Quaida and the governments that harbor and finance them for attacking us. Let’s look at improving the flow of communications between agencies. Let’s work on destroying the groups that threaten democracy and sequester decency. Let’s focus on working on a plan to make things better. Let Clarke and others who say we could have done better, point out what we can do now to improve the system. Let Clarke shoulder some of the responsibility for being in a position to sound an alarm if there was need to sound one prior to September 11. I don’t care if Clarke couldn’t convince two presidents that snuffing out Osama and Al Quaida was the right thing to do, today. Even I could write a book about failures in communications, blown plays, and poor execution after the fact, after the whistle is blown to end a game. It is planning for the next game that makes a coach a winner, learning from failure and working to improve for the next time. Losers cry over the failures and point fingers. Leaders learn from the failures and work to improve subsequent systems so that we can make better decisions and execute better.

I can tell you what the commission will report – several lapses in communications could have been better handled, higher priorities should have been given to this threat, with better information from intelligence and a lot of luck, this disaster could have been avoided. Could have, would have…with a lot of luck. Good luck to all of us if we think that we can plan to avoid evil from attacking good people in the future. We can keep a vigilence and strengthen our watch of the evil groups that foster hatred. We can weaken these groups by going after them and their finances. However, we are fools if we think we can avoid evil deeds with this or any other government. God bless us all.

Aside from the excessive use of “evil” by Bill, and ending the rant with “god bless us all,” he has a point. Hindsight is always 20/20.

The problem is, that isn’t the point.

This isn’t just “a communication breakdown.” This is simply people in charge of ensuring the safety of the public flat out neglecting to do so. Also, the reaction employed was as far from the initial proposal as it could be. Not to mention how contrary it will be to U.S. interests in the long-term.

But god forbid Americans take the longview. Especially those currently in office and those pulling the puppets’ strings.